My mate Fay's just been on telly

[Wyatt Earp]

Talking to Brian Cox about quantum spacetime.

She rules, Fay does. One of the nicest people in this or any other braneworld.

Sorry, I just felt the fact needed celebrating.

[Ginger Yellow]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

That programmme was yet another example, as if any were needed, that Horizon would be much better if they just let scientists talk about how cool and weird the universe is instead of trying to sensationalise and human interest it.

[wingco]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Didn't see this but yes, something really bad has happened to Horizon. Does Roger Alton edit it now, or something?

[Gangster Octopus]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

wingco wrote:

something really bad has happened to Horizon.

Quite. I did have a minor whine about it on otf, so The Horse told me to write to Radio Times about it. However, I'm English, so all I could do was tut to myself...

[NHH]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Ooh, don't get me started.

You can clearly tell it's made for international commercial TV audiences, because every 10 fucking minutes they repeat the premise of the fucking show; 'so, could the team of researchers crack the code of why we're all fat cunts? Over in Montreal, Dr Noonian Singh had a brainwave...'

aarrrrrrggghhhh. I know the premise. I read it in the TV guide. I'm intrested, and have a brain which can retain several pieces of information, including WHAT THE FUCKING TV PROGRAMME IS ABOUT SO STOP TELLING ME EVERY CUNTING 10 FUCKING MINUTES

[West End Zuma]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Is Braneworld and M Theory still viable in the world of theoretical physics? I ask because theoretical physics seem to change with the weather so I'm wondering if the latest book I bought on this stuff two years ago might still be current.

[Mitch]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

The best thing in that programme was the new ultra-slow camera they used to film someone popping a balloon full of water.

It looked absolutely incredible. A genuine "'kin look at that!" moment.

[Mumpo]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

NHH wrote:

You can clearly tell it's made for international commercial TV audiences, because every 10 fucking minutes they repeat the premise of the fucking show; 'so, could the team of researchers crack the code of why we're all fat cunts? Over in Montreal, Dr Noonian Singh had a brainwave...'

aarrrrrrggghhhh. I know the premise. I read it in the TV guide. I'm intrested, and have a brain which can retain several pieces of information, including WHAT THE FUCKING TV PROGRAMME IS ABOUT SO STOP TELLING ME EVERY CUNTING 10 FUCKING MINUTES

Oh yes, those 'advert insertion points' are one of my TV bugbears (about 110th on the list, at the last count). Another sign that it's happened is that the names of the contributors keep popping up in captions all over again.

[ursus arctos]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

I'm not sure that I've ever seen Horizon.

Is it really syndicated widely overseas? The US counterpart is the PBS series Nova, which could be seen as occupying the field in the US.

The "BBC World News" and "BBC Prime" channels that we get as part of our Sky Italia package have ad breaks every 15 minutes.

[Pinback]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

I thought this was slightly better than some recent Horizons, but that's not saying much.

I find it's standards so low these days that I'm starting to question whether it's just me being a grumpy old codger; that I just don't get it or something.

On a slightly different note, I can guarantee that over on mumsnet right now, there will be a massive thread dedicated to how yummy Brian Cox is.

[Ginger Yellow]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

"The best thing in that programme was the new ultra-slow camera they used to film someone popping a balloon full of water."

Indeed. There are quite a few videos like that on the web, and they're pretty much the coolest things in the world.

UA: Discovery usually picks up Horizon shows after a few months, certainly the good ones like this one.

[Alderman Barnes]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Is it really syndicated widely overseas?

The VOX channel in Germany has a programme called "BBC Exklusiv" where they show repackaged documentaries, and a lot of them are from Horizon, by the look of them.

[Wyatt Earp]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Nova is Horizon: it's a co-production. They edit the footage differently and often use different voiceovers. but it's the same show.

[evilC]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Pinback wrote:

I find it's standards so low these days that I'm starting to question whether it's just me being a grumpy old codger; that I just don't get it or something.

Nope - you're right. It's almost embarrassingly bad nowadays.

Back in the late 70s and early 80s we could justifiably be proud of our television over here. You could recommend visitors to the country to watch 'Horizon', 'Life On Earth' or 'The World At War' without hesitation, but these days I'd be trying to prevent them from watching anything on our screens, pretty much!

[ursus arctos]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Wyatt, are they all co-productions?

Nova certainly does its best to give the impression that they produce independent content.

[Wyatt Earp]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

ursus arctos wrote:

Wyatt, are they all co-productions?

Ah, there you have me.

[Ginger Yellow]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Cox's wife has put up a couple of photos from the high speed camera bit. This is the best one:

[Pinback]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Rather mouthwateringly, these kinds of cameras will soon be fairly reasonably priced.

Casio EX-FH20

[Mumpo]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Balloonwateringly.

[Andy C]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

I thought this was slightly better than some recent Horizons, but that's not saying much.

I wouldn't be as grudging as that: I though it was quite good, for what it set out to do. I thought it did give a sense of the wierdnesses that are uncovered once you start investigating what, to some people, must almost be a non-question. The stuff about looking back in time the further you look across the universe must have started a few thought processes in people who hadn't previously delved into the subject, for example. And I thought Cox's genial enthusiasm carried it quite well.

One of the problems, though is that "some people": the "two cultures" thing is still pretty much endemic, so it can't be easy for the programme makers to identify who their target audience is. You've the people with a bit of science in them who'd want to see something with a bit more concrete analysis, and you've got the others who label 2+2 as geekery. This wasn't a bad stab at a compromise, I reckon.

You'd need to invent a special notation to express how many times this was better than that mental health gameshow.

[Wyatt Earp]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Ben Goldacre made the point, on the radio recently, that the constituency of what you might call lay science autodidacts is actually pretty large, and almost completely neglected by the broadcast media and the papers. (I mean, even those of us with expertise in one field are at best lay autodidacts in most of the others.) This problem is getting worse, I think.

The thing the other day on Einstein and Eddington with the Doctor in it is a case in point, really. The physics side of it was comically distorted for dramatic effect. Yer British Physics Establishment was presented as absurdly hidebound and anti-Continental to the point of caricature, with old Oliver Lodge seemingly unaware of the work of Minkowski or Lorentz, or of the conflict between Newton's Laws and Maxwell's equations. (In fact, from what I've been able to find out, Lodge strongly advocated Lorentz's ideas, while not wanting to throw over the "aether"). This was done, I assume, purely to cast Eddington as the heroic Lover Of Truth taking on the crusty old bigots. History of Science as a kind of Catherine Cookson novel.

[amp]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Some slo-mo videos

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/yt-kgd...otion_punches/

and one of my favourites
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=bx0UwY5IQMo

[evilC]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

amp wrote:

Some slo-mo videos

...

and one of my favourites
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=bx0UwY5IQMo

Ha! I've got that on my Myspace page!

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

They really have a terrible problem pitching science programmes don't they? I saw a programme on channel four the other night about the freezing of the earth about 650 million years ago which consisted of the occasional talking head saying something very interesting, before cutting back to baldrick shouting very loudly more or less the key points of the last couple of seconds of the talking head, before shouting about London was under hundreds of feet of snow, and how the world was completely covered in snow, and almost all life was extinguished (ad nauseum)

It could have been such a brilliant programme about a fascinating topic but instead all I could really think about was how bad this programme was, and unconsciously comparing it to brilliant scripting and programme structure of the James Burke Connections programmes I used to watch as a kid.

[Wyatt Earp]

My mate Fay's just been on telly

Which at the time was condemned as dumbing down (though we didn't call it that then).